Green Party Deputy Leader to speak at international anti-war conference

Green Party Deputy Leader to speak at international anti-war conference

5 June 2015

*Green Party Deputy Leader Shahrar Ali to speak at Stop the War Coalition Conference, Saturday 6 June

*Shahrar Ali will speak on the topic of migration and war

Shahrar Ali, Deputy Leader of the Green Party of England and Wales, is to speak at the Stop the War Coalition’s Conference ‘Confronting a World at War’ on Saturday 6 June.

The conference brings together writers, activists and politicians from around the world to analyse recent conflicts and current foreign policy approaches.

Shahrar Ali said:

“The Green Party will contribute to this important debate about conflict resolution with an analysis of unjust war as a major cause of displacement of peoples. Too often governments fail to recognise the long-term impact of foreign policy disasters on the lives of untold families, forced to flee from persecution or from the destructive power of arms these governments have sold abroad or used themselves.

“The UK must not add to the suffering of those fleeing from war with the imposition of arbitrary restrictions on movement, which often have inhumane consequences. We must hold to our collective obligations as a common humanity and take joint responsibility for instability we have directly caused or are implicated in.

“We have clear policies on dialogue, peace, diplomacy and international cooperation which aim to tackle forced migration at source, to grant communities both the capability to live in peace and also the right of return.”

The Green Party has opposed recent UK interventions in Iraq, Libya and Afghanistan, and holds that the UK needs to rethink its current defence policy. In particular, the Green Party advocates the abolition of Trident.